He almost nailed it, he really did. For three hours and 20 minutes, or 122 deliveries if you prefer, James Vince cast aside all the natural instincts of a second division county batsman and batted like an international. His longest, most diligent Test innings, and equal to his highest. Forty-two of the most restrained, composed runs he has possibly scored in his life.
Then came the second new ball. Three exploratory deliveries from Rahat Ali to finish an over, the last of which was flicked by Vince with delicious insouciance and the timing of a Rolex to the square leg boundary for a seventh boundary. Next, a couple of balls from the galloping major, Sohail Khan, from the City end, and a single, before Misbah-ul-Haq threw the ball to Mohammad Amir to replace Rahat. Amir has a fast arm, like the blur of the great Wasim Akram, generating a sort of whiplash speed.
His first ball was a fraction back of a good length and angled across Vince on the line the Pakistan bowlers have been pursuing against him all series and the Sri Lankans before them. Bowling to Vince the seamers have taken on the persona of fishermen, baiting their hooks and casting them out in the knowledge that there is a shoal out there that will bite sooner rather than later.
Time after time Vince has nibbled and nicked: all too easy. Scores of 9, 35, 10, 0, 16, 42, 18 and 39 do not belie an image of someone who has not come to terms with the step up in standard.
This is a clever bowler, though, and sometimes cerebral operators such as he do the unexpected. Amir’s natural delivery, and – as Mitchell Starc, another brilliant left-armer, is showing for Australia – the one that is regarded as the most dangerous for a right-handed batsman is the ball from over the wicket that swings in, down the line of the stumps and targets the pads.
Although there had been little in the way of lateral movement with the old ball, Vince would have been anticipating the new ball delivered by such a skilled exponent was likely to swing and probably in to him. By the time he realised that Amir, the cunning devil, had slanted the ball across his bows instead, it was too late to adjust properly.
With no further foot movement, Vince’s bat jabbed out instinctively, at an angle, half push, half steer. The ball took the edge and Younis Khan made no mistake at second slip. Vince reacted as if he had been stunned, bent double as the bowler aeroplaned past him, before slowly, painfully, dragging himself away, past the non-striker Gary Ballance, and back to the dressing room. He will berate himself for what he will regard as a lapse in concentration, but he should give some credit to the bowler for outfoxing him.
Until his dismissal he had played an excellent innings. Although some scores around the shires might suggest otherwise, this was a beautiful day for batting. The sun shone, there was warmth in the breeze, gentler than the first three days, and if the ground was not packed as it had been on the third day, there was enough of the bear pit atmosphere to gladden the England team who thrive here. The pitch looked benign still and there were runs to be made, surely there were? Instead, inside the first hour, Alastair Cook and Alex Hales – so secure on the third evening – were gone so that Vince and Root were together.
Root is the master batsman now, one for Vince to watch and learn from at close quarters. In his brief career Vince has shown an enviably natural strokeplaying flair but little evidence of batting nous, the capacity to understand conditions, types of bowling, and how to match up a gameplan to it. Having a plethora of shots is a fraction of the game – knowing when to use them is the key. There was a lot of animated mid-pitch conversation between the two. Vince, who is more than mindful of the flaws in his game and determined to rectify them, reined himself in.
Balls that were sent across him were ignored with commendable self-denial where once he had been chasing them with varying degrees of success. Playing the percentages is part of the game. The Pakistan bowlers began to come to him instead of him chasing the ball. There was one sumptuous cover drive, but one played with the front foot perfectly placed near the line of the ball, and boundaries clipped off his toes. Runs came off his legs, an area that had been barren in previous innings and a sure indication in a change of line from the bowlers. When Pakistan decided to go through an attritional period by using a packed off side field, the batsmen ignored it.
Together Vince and Root added 95 runs, and, from a shade over 36 overs, it was scarcely skittish. In a way though it was to Vince’s credit that it was Root who cracked first, attempting to sweep Yasir Shah out of the rough and getting a gentle top edge to short fine leg. Vince can put that feather in his cap: cut off short it may have been but this was by far his most accomplished innings for England.
